Monday, June 27, 2011

Gesture Drawing Exercise set - Sketchingeveryday.com

Sandy from sketchingeveryday.com has set a new weekly challenge for folks to join in and try their hand at. Great exercise where you have only two minutes to complete a contourgesture sketch. She's using an elephant trinket and the object is to do a quick contour sketch, turn the elephant a quarter turn and repeat until you have four sketches. Do check out her site and join in.

NOTE: I misunderstood the exercise and have made corrections as indicated with the line-throughs. My examples below are actual contour sketches and not the gesture sketches I should have done working more detail......ooops.And I learned something new today.........I hadn't given much thought to there being a difference between contour and gesture means of sketching. Forever learning :-)

Here is my attempt. I first tried a blind contour just to see how it would go. Then I started the timed exercise.

Instead of timing each for 2 minutes, I set my timer for eight minutes knowing I had four sketches to complete. I jumped in not thinking about subject but quickly following lines and shapes to draw the elephant. This was relaxing and definitely fun......even with it being timed. I really didn't think about it as I was focused on getting what I saw on screen on paper. And I finished before the timer went off.

3 comments:

Thank you Susan for jumping right in again!! These really turned out good. The 2 min. drawings are supposed to be gesture drawings, not contour. A gesture drawing may be any drawing from 30 seconds to 2 minutes which attempts to capture action or movement. I'd like to see more on the inside next time instead of just being concerned with the outside edge or contour of the object.

I misunderstood from your blind contour flower sketch and then mentioning the 2 minute exercise.......I've corrected the post above showing my error so people reading will not follow incorrectly what you had intended ;-) Thank you for sharing too the difference between contour and gesture. I've really never given much thought about them being different. I've learned something valuable today........thank you :-D

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About Me

Art hobbyist / sketcher / watercolorist who loves sharing with the hopes it might encourage others in their journey with sketching and painting.
Started out 30 plus years ago painting in acrylic on wood, glass, and metal surfaces until I was introduced to watercolor in 1991. A medium I fell in love with immediately.
Over the past few years, I have been drawn into Pen and Ink as well as the Art of Journaling or keeping an Artist's Journal which is my new love!
Expanding my horizons a bit, I've been playing with digital sketching as well.